Ford's Wixom plant heads to the great assembly line in the sky
The "Way Forward" has claimed its latest victim, this time in the form of the 50-year-old Wixom plant in Michigan. The production center, tasked with building Lincolns since 1957, has built its final White Chocolate Town Car destined for a customer in Washington D.C.
However, the Town Car hasn't met its demise yet. Production will continue at the St. Thomas plant in Ontario, Canada, along side its Panther brethren, the Crown Victoria and the Grand Marquis.
Wixom was housed production in the recent past for the Lincoln LS, Continental and Ford Thunderbird. Even Ford's ultimate halo car, the GT, received its finishing touches at Wixom.
[Source: Ford]
PRESS RELEASE:
PRODUCTION ENDS AT WIXOM ASSEMBLY PLANT, LINCOLN TOWN CAR MOVES TO ST. THOMAS
DEARBORN, Mich., May 31, 2007 – Production ended today at 12:55 p.m. at Ford Motor Company's Wixom Assembly Plant when the last vehicle, a 2007 White Chocolate Lincoln Town Car, rolled off the assembly line.
The vehicle will be shipped to a dealership in Gaithersburg, Maryland, where an anxious customer will take delivery of the last Wixom-built Lincoln sedan.
Wixom, which opened in 1957 as the Lincoln Assembly Plant, produced 6.6 million vehicles in its 50 years of operation.
Production of the Lincoln Town Car will be moved to St. Thomas Assembly Plant in Ontario and will commence in the fourth quarter there.
About 1,100 employees were on hand to pay tribute to the plant's legacy.
"This is a great workforce, a proud workforce," said Philip Calhoun, plant manager. "They produced a quality vehicle up to the last one they built."
Wixom Assembly Plant is one of 16 Ford facilities to be idled under the Way Forward plan to return the company's North American automotive operations to profitability.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Don 5:35PM (6/01/2007)
Can someone set me up with the hot line worker?
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aaron 5:51PM (6/01/2007)
Yeah, wow.
Don 5:52PM (6/01/2007)
Lol! I was expecting some middle-aged white guy with beer gut and plumber's crack.
jrockthamic 5:56PM (6/01/2007)
Yeah, I would actually work at a factory if women like that work there. However she probably smokes, talks like a man, and swears like a sailor.........Oh yeah that's my perfect lady.
JIMY 5:58PM (6/01/2007)
The assembly worker sure seems pleased.
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H 6:15PM (6/01/2007)
before i even clicked on the link, I knew people would be commenting on the chick.
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adelossa 6:40PM (6/01/2007)
More of that girl please. :D
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Greek Boy 7:36PM (6/01/2007)
This is exactly what is wrong with the UAW. Rather than have this hot babe become an engineer, a pilot, a doctor, a lawyer, or even a porn star, the daddy instead gets her a job working at Ford making Town Cars. What a waste.
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Don 2:15AM (6/02/2007)
Uh, I'll take a line job assembling Towncars.
TIMMAH! 7:36PM (6/01/2007)
Yeah just waiting for the 'Women of Wixom' issue of FHM...
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Big Rocket 9:05PM (6/01/2007)
Take a closer look at what the woman was supposedly writing. The line was: "Last Car From Wixom", and every last letter had been fully written down. But, if you look closely, you can see the woman was holding the piece of chalk somewhere between the last two letters.
My guess? It seems like someone else had written down "Last Car From Wixom", but the PR guys for the UAW decided to use a pretty face to gather sympathy for their cause. For that purpose, they chose the most attractive woman in the entire plant. Or, the most attractive woman who agreed to the staged publicity photo.
And now you know... the rest of the story.
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Andy 10:55PM (6/01/2007)
Dude...you think about these things way too much.
TeamNutmeg 6:50PM (6/02/2007)
You're reading too much into this. That wasn't a PR stunt. They just put a recall out on the "M," and she was installing the new one. "Quality is job 1!"
Sickmanseth 11:31PM (6/01/2007)
There's enough town cars and crown vics in new york city that they shouldn't ever have to build any more. Subaru's latest marketing campaign claims they are the "official car of new york." Bull. it's the ford panther platform by a loooongshot.
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JN 12:11AM (6/02/2007)
Some pretty great Lincolns came out of Wixom. My wife's grandmother is proudly driving her second Town Car, a gorgeous gold '06 Signature Limited. I'm nearing 30, but I absolutely LOVE sliding behind the wheel of that beautiful automobile. Nothing beats a Town Car. Nothing!
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John 12:22AM (6/02/2007)
Jesus she is so hot. Can I employ her?
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That One Person 9:38AM (6/02/2007)
Greek Boy...so how is it the UAW's fault that the girl is working in a plant? Did they force her? I doubt it. I bet she is doing this as a temporary job. I know a few people who have. They only work in a plant for maybe five months. It's better than a part time summer job at McDonald's. And who says her father got her this job? Do you know this girl personally? Do you know her dad? Do you know anything?
Big Rocket...do you have a life or did you sit there for a couple hours going over this picture? How do you know she didnt write it? Maybe she DID write it but then posed for the picture because SHE wanted to. MAYBE she was going over the lettering, again. You are digging too deep, bro.
Anyways, she can assemble my car anyday :)
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Ben K. 10:13AM (6/02/2007)
So much for cute remarks, you guys are missing the point. Joking about hundreds of people losing their jobs is pathetic. Most of these Ford employees aren't responsible for bad management decisions. It's a sad day when people feel no sense of loss for the thousands of jobs being exported to other countries. Ford still sells as many vehicles as Honda and Nissan combined, but you wouldn't know it by reading the media reports. A majority of the Wixom workers did their job to the best of their ability, their 50 years of automotive history has seen it's final chapter. My heart goes out to these workers, I know first hand. The GM plant in OKC was idled 15 months ago, when higher gas prices affected SUV sales. OKC's plant was only 27 years old, switched from cars to SUV's in 2002. After investing $750 million to build SUV's, an F4 tornado hit our plant in May 2003. GM quickly rebuilt the plant in two months, it was quite an accomplishment. OKC was always considered as one of GM's best factory, winning several J.D. Powers awards. But, Nov.21, 2005 GM idled OKC within 90 days. The local union offered $143 million in annual cost cuts and the state offered $200 million to retool the plant. But offers were ignored, it's very discouraging at this time. Blogging serves as good therapy, good luck in the future retire Wixom employees.
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Guenther 6:14PM (6/03/2007)
Things had been looking more and more ghostly around the plant over the last year, as things wound down. It will look really sad this year without Santa Claus flying high above the plant next to I96.
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jkd 11:14AM (6/04/2007)
Did any of you actually SEE the last car? It was literally duct taped together because is was missing half it's parts!! The lineworkers didn't give a crap about it because they all got SCREWED! The plant manager told the media everyone got placed - if that's the case, why are almost 600 people sitting on metal folding chairs in a plywood-built "room" in the middle of the plant for 8 hours a day? Any of you that think that's a gravy "job" are nuts. You'd be hard pressed to find anyone there who wouldn't rather be working someplace.
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